Vinyl Record Sales Experienced Double-Digit Growth Once Again Last Year

Even cassettes are seeing a continued resurgence.

BuzzAngle’s new report on 2018 music consumption in the US is packed with insights about the changing landscape of the modern music industry, including the continued resurgence of vinyl records. The format, left for dead by the early 1990s, has experienced a remarkable resurgence in the last few years. In 2018, vinyl experienced its second straight year of double-digit growth, with sales up 12 percent compared to 2017.

Last year, vinyl sales grew by an even more impressive 20 percent. The format now accounts for 13.7 percent of all physical music sales, up from just eight percent two years ago. This is partially attributable to the decline of CDs, which saw sales fall 18.5 percent from last year. Still, consumers purchased over 60 million physical CDs last year, compared to less than 10 million vinyl records.

More than 40 percent of vinyl sales are rock music, with an additional 25 percent coming from pop. R&B and hip-hop respectively took 7.9 and 6.6 percent of the vinyl market. As BuzzAngle reports, “deep catalog” titles (meaning albums released more than three years ago) account for 66 percent of all vinyl record sales in the US. Amongst them is 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy: Awesome Mix Vol.1, which was the top-selling vinyl record once again in 2018.

Vinyl isn’t the only physical format experiencing a resurgence. Cassette sales, although still small, grew by almost 19 percent last year. Consumers purchased over 118,000 new cassettes, as the low-cost, nostalgic format continues to regain popularity. As Grammy.com reported in 2017, the cassette reissue of popular recent albums like Taylor Swift’s reputation and Lana Del Rey’s Lust For Life, as well as rock and hip-hop classics, have driven sales at retailers like Urban Outfitters.